Gathering - The Holy Longing.

With all that has gone on in our relationship with "church" over the past year of our spiritual journey, Jamie and I have a kind of love-hate relationship with the institution called "church". So when I was reading The Holy Longing and came across this, I really resonated with it... perhaps you might too.

How much I must criticize you, my church and yet how much I love you!
You have made me suffer more than anyone and yet I owe more to you than to anyone.
I should like to see you destroyed and yet I need your presence.
You have given me much scandal and yet you alone have made me understand holiness.
Never in this world have I seen anything more compromised, more false, yet never have I touched anything more pure, more generous or more beautiful.
Countless times I have felt like slamming the door of my soul in your face - and yet, every night, I have prayed that I might die in your arms!
No, I cannot be free of you, for I am one with you, even if not completely you.
Then too - where would I go?
To build another church?
But I could not build one without the same defects, for they are my defects. And again, if I were to build another church, it would be my church, not Christ's church.
No. I am old enough. I know better!

Ever been there?

So lately I've been awakening to the realization that I am deeply drawn to Jesus and those who want to seek him. I am drawn and captured by the ekklesia, but not the traditional institution that often masquerades as the ekklesia. I truly believe that Jesus is inviting us into a community of faith - a community of the King and his Kingdom. I meet so many people who are drawn to Jesus, but not to the "church" as they have experienced it. I want my life to be spent, burned up in the pursuit of seeing a new expression of a faith community. I want to be a part of a faith community that proclaims the Kingdom breaking into this world - a movement of people who have oriented their lives around the person and treachings of Jesus. I love the ekklesia. I love the church - with all it's imperfections... because the church's imperfections are my own. We are the church. We cannot escape the community of faith.

So may we be the kinds of people who re-imagine for a desperate world what the church is all about. May we be the kinds of people who embrace each other, with our imperfections, in beauty and forgiveness. May we be about inviting people into a refreshingly hungry community of people who are consumed with seeing this world become all that God has in mind.

Comments

[mike vanderkwaak]

yes, embracing, understanding, concern for others. have you listened to rob's work on col 1 in his message "wholeness"? -mvk

[mike erre]

Mike, I am sorry to hear of the difficulty of the last 8 months...if you ever want to hang, email me...

[john]

Hmm...looks like yet another book to add to my wishlist...

[Tom]

all I can say is that my heart and soul literally yearned to traverse through cyberspace and shout with you: YES, YES---this is where I am in my walk with Christ! This is my sentiment to our stewardship of His Bride!

and I don't know what to do next. i'm on "sabbatical" from seminary, becoming bored with church because I know that God is bigger than how we choose to worship Him in a communal way...and feeling stuck because I cannot see an immediate answer to my frustration. I wait and pray and read and wrestle and find other like minds...but wonder-- should I move and act...but am waiting for myself to feel confirmation that the timing is right.